Latest / Kvetch & Release / B.C. police chiefs' president says half of hydromorphone recently seized from safer supply

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B.C. police chiefs' president says half of hydromorphone recently seized from safer supply · Kvetch & Release

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  Really interesting column that was published in the National Post that I've been wanting to
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  speak to the author about as it relates to the Safer Supply program of opioids.
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  We've just found out that in a House of Commons Health Committee hearing,
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  two high ranking police representatives of Vancouver Police disclosed disclosed several unsettling facts about widespread
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  diversion of safer supply opioids. Joining me right now to discuss this column is
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  the author of it, Adam Zevo, who is a founding member, the
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  core member of the Center for Responsible Drug Policy. He's the executive director.
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  There. Hey, Adam, how you doing. Hey, I'm good.
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  Thanks for having me back on the show. Thank you for joining me here.
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  So pretty interesting comments from these law enforcement members in front of this committee.
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  Here, Why don't you break down what we found out? Okay,
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  So, as Sanday, just for contact Safer Supply, as this program that
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  gives ut free recreational drugs as a quote unquote safer alternatives potentially change tolicit substances.
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  Let's say, for example, you're buying fensanel on the street. You
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  don't know what's in it, you don't know what the quantity is, so
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  the idea is that we'll give you pharmaceutical drugs and said, and that will
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  help ensure that you stay alive until you're willing to seek treatments. The problem,
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  though, is that we give a drug called hydro morphone, which is
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  as potent as heroin, but is only about one tent to strong defensinel.
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  So people who are gifted defenseanel who do the reasonable thing into situation, they
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  sell their free safe supply to make money to buy stronger drugs on the streets.
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  So we're actually subsidizing the defensible market, not mitigating it, and we're
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  flooding communities with diverted hydro morphones. Now Safer supply advocates have said that this
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  diversion crisis is a myth, even though over the past year there's been more
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  and more evidence that that is not the case and the diversion is actually very
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  common. What is interesting about this testimony here is that the Deputy chief of
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  the Vancouver Police Department confirmed to Parliament that fully half of the hydro morphone recently
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  seized in British Columbia can be attributed it's a safer supply, So we know
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  that safer supply which is given to only four thousand, five thousand people,
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  has doubled the amounts of this very dangerous opiate on the streets. Meanwhile,
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  the RCMP contact there confirmed that organized crime is involved in the trafficking is a
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  safer supply. So both of these things individual are concerning and put together are
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  particularly concerning. So why is it then that you know, us here in
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  Ontario should be worried about this. This is something that's happening in British Columbia
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  and you know, of course, you know, nobody want nobody wants to
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  see people going through hardships, whether it be because of addiction and or mental
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  health, are the fact they're using these drugs. But why is this localized
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  for other places in Canada. Well, the thing is that safer supply is
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  not just available in BC, It's actually available in Ontario. And in fact,
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  we actually give out more safer supply drugs in Ontario than in BC.
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  In BC, a single safer supply client we get fourteen hundred rolson pills a
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  day. In Ontario, the technical limit is twenty four, but people often
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  go up to thirty. So the potential for diversion of Ontario is quite high.
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  And based on a number of interviews with addiction positions, former drug users,
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  people who stuge with homelessness, it seems a diversion is happening at a
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  very high level in this province. So it's been a particular issue in London,
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  Ontario, where Canada's first safe supply program opened up in twenty sixteen,
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  and it's actually being resold from that city all across the province. I know
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  from government contacts that there's been a particular problem with SAE supply diversion ending up
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  in indigenous reserves in Northern Ontario. And I think that this is particularly concerning
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  this issue concerning for Windsor, because I know from speaking with drug dealers that
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  it's being trafficked abroad, and of course Windsor's on the border, so we
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  can expect that some divert safe supply is flowing through the city as well and
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  making it onto the streets potentially too. So I guess you know the question
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  would be, as you know, the executive director of this organization, what
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  would be responsible drug policy? Well, I here's the thing. I think
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  that there is a potential use for safe drugs to help people transition on traditional
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  addiction medications like methadone and suboxone. So I think that safe supply could have
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  a use, but it needs to be monitored, It needs to be witnessed.
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  Right now, we just hand people bottles of pills. You know,
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  in each pill here is very dangerous for the average person who doesn't use opioids,
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  and we say, you know, do whatever you want with them.
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  I mean, we tell them, you know, you should use them,
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  but there's no accountability there. We need to change safe supplies so that every
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  single dose is witnessed. That would immediately remove the diversion crisis. And we
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  need to ensure that safer supply is not given to drug users indefinitely, because
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  that only entrenches their addiction and dissuades them from seeking treatment. We need to
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  ensure that it is used as a time limited intervention to help people transition into
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  recovery. So why is it that the you know, harm reduction advocates or
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  whatever you want to refer to. These people are who opposes you know,
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  rethinking drug policy. Why have they tried to minimize the actual impacts? Do
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  you think? What have you heard? Well? Here here's the issue is
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  that many of the researchers and activists working in the space are quite ideological,
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  and they really really want drug legalization because they think that drugs are not harmful.
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  It is the criminalization of drugs that are harmful. They genuinely believe that
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  heroin is not the problem. It's the fact that heroin is illegal that's the
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  problem. And for many of them, they see safer supply as a stepping
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  stone to legalization. So if you if you concede that safer supply has significant
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  negative community impacts, that gets in the way of their long term drug legalization
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  strategy. For many of these advocates, they actually believe that it's a positive
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  thing that diversion is happening because they want to see how our markets flooded with
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  pharmaceutical opioids because they think that it will displace potentially toxic illicit substances. But
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  that just doesn't seem to be what's happening in practice. It seems that it's
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  actually ballooning the market so that you have illicited substances plus pharmaceutical substances. But
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  for some reason they don't want to accept that. So last question I want
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  to ask you, and we'll have to get into the politics of this here
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  apologies for that. Who would have thought you reported that the Premier of British
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  Columbia told reporters that this was the first time that he had heard of You
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  know, up to approximately twenty percent of the people who are prescribed hydro morphone
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  and BC are enrolled in a safer supply program. I applying per capita safer
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  supply clients divert four times to the black market than people who receive the drug
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  for other reasons. What do you think when you hear the premiere go,
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  I don't know any of this. Well, well, so just a quick
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  thing is actually only five percent of people receive of hydromorphonic patient term savor supply,
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  so they're actually eighteen times more likely to divert. I find it far
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  fetched that the Premier didn't do about this because the Premier and administered Mental Condiction
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  keep on emphasizing that they are closely monitoring safer supply. So either they are
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  being dishonest or they are much less competent than they want us to believe.
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  Well, two great options for people to choose from there, right, Adam,
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  I want to thank you so much for joining me to discuss this,
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  and of course you're going to be following this file for quite some time,
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  so we'll get another conversation or two at some point. Thank you so much.
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  It's a pleasure. Thanks for having me. Cheers. Adam Zevo is
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  the executive director of the Center for Responsible Drug Policy,